Lamb McErlane PC Partner Maureen M. McBride is Appellate Counsel for Mitsubishi in its Post-Trial Challenge to the $976 Million Amagasu Verdict
Law.com/Legal Intelligencer Article, January 10, 2024
By: Aleeza Furman, Litigation Reporter, Law.com / Legal Intelligencer
The plaintiffs who won a nearly $1 billion defective seatbelt case against Mitsubishi contend that the carmaker’s attempts to challenge the verdict are baseless.
Attorneys for the plaintiffs in Amagasu v. Fred Beans Family of Dealerships argued in a Jan. 5 brief, that, among other things, the defendants missed their chance to raise one of the key issues in their challenge.
“Post-trial motions are not an appropriate time to make entirely novel arguments disconnected from the evidence and the advocacy presented at trial,” Daniel Sherry of Eisenberg, Rothweiler, Winkler, Eisenberg & Jeck, who represented plaintiffs Francis and Soomi Amagasu, said.
Sherry called the various requests found in the defendant’s motion for post-trial relief “farcical.”
William Conroy of Campbell Conroy & O’Neil, who represents the defendants, did not respond to requests for comment.
In an emailed statement, appellate counsel for Mitsubishi, Maureen McBride of Lamb McErlane, said, “Mitsubishi is confident that the court will carefully review the parties’ respective filings and reach the right conclusion in this case.”
Mitsubishi raised a litany of arguments in its post-trial challenge to the $976 million Amagasu verdict, which a Philadelphia jury awarded in October. The “centerpiece” of that motion, according to the plaintiffs’ 103-page response brief, was the assertion that the jurors were not given proper instructions on crashworthiness.
Mitsubishi wrote in its motion that, ”Whether by accident or design, plaintiffs’ counsel misled the court” into omitting a portion of the jury instruction saying the plaintiff must prove that the defect caused more damages than would likely have been caused by the original impact. Because of the purported mistake, the defendants argued, the court should award a new trial.
The plaintiffs refuted the notion that they misled the court, commenting that the defense “notably toned down and receded from the accusatory rhetoric” in its subsequent brief.
The plaintiffs argued that the defendants, too, played a role in the omission of a section of the suggested standard jury instructions.
According to the Amagasus’ brief, Mitsubishi never objected to or mentioned the omitted text to the court. “Instead,” the plaintiffs wrote, “Mitsubishi objected to the failure to give its instruction, but Mitsubishi’s proposed instruction did not include the language of the missing second paragraph from plaintiffs’ proposed instruction that Mitsubishi now characterizes as a critical omission.”
As a result, the plaintiffs asserted, Mitsubishi waived its challenge to the omission.
The plaintiffs additionally argued that the crashworthiness charge was proper under Pennsylvania law and that verdict form confirms that the jury found in the plaintiffs’ favor on the various elements of the crashworthiness test.
“Even if Mitsubishi’s challenge to this court’s crashworthiness instructions had merit (and it does not),” the plaintiffs added, “a new trial would not be necessary or appropriate unless this court’s jury instructions concerning plaintiffs’ other alternate grounds for recovery—consumer expectation, risk utility and failure to warn—also were defective, which is something Mitsubishi nowhere contends in its motion for post-trial relief.”
Mitsubishi also took aim at the size of the jury’s verdict for the Amagasus, which included $176.5 million in compensatory damages and $800 million in punitive damages.
But Sherry asserted that the defendants did not present evidence on damages at trial to support their claim that the award was excessive.
“If you’re going to court and saying ‘that was wrong, that needs to be reduced,’ one would expect that you would have evidence to point to,” Sherry said.
Sherry said that, despite the many issues raised in the defendants’ post-trial filings, “there is not the scintilla of merit that should even raise any level of eyebrow.”
The parties’ motions are pending before Judge Sierra Thomas Street of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, who also presided over the trial.
The plaintiff claimed that an improper seatbelt design in Mitsubishi’s 1992 model 3000GT sports car allowed Francis Amagasu to sustain head injuries in a car crash that left him quadriplegic.
According to Sherry, the case itself was fairly simple, involving significant agreement on issues of what happened and the extent of the plaintiffs’ injuries.
“This is not a situation where there’s a lot of ambiguity or mystery,” he said. “Instead it is remarkably straightforward in all aspects.”
In an emailed statement, appellate counsel for Mitsubishi, Maureen McBride of Lamb McErlane, said, “Mitsubishi is confident that the court will carefully review the parties’ respective filings and reach the right conclusion in this case.”
Mitsubishi raised a litany of arguments in its post-trial challenge to the $976 million Amagasu verdict, which a Philadelphia jury awarded in October. The “centerpiece” of that motion, according to the plaintiffs’ 103-page response brief, was the assertion that the jurors were not given proper instructions on crashworthiness.
Mitsubishi wrote in its motion that, ”Whether by accident or design, plaintiffs’ counsel misled the court” into omitting a portion of the jury instruction saying the plaintiff must prove that the defect caused more damages than would likely have been caused by the original impact. Because of the purported mistake, the defendants argued, the court should award a new trial.
The plaintiffs refuted the notion that they misled the court, commenting that the defense “notably toned down and receded from the accusatory rhetoric” in its subsequent brief.
The plaintiffs argued that the defendants, too, played a role in the omission of a section of the suggested standard jury instructions.
According to the Amagasus’ brief, Mitsubishi never objected to or mentioned the omitted text to the court. “Instead,” the plaintiffs wrote, “Mitsubishi objected to the failure to give its instruction, but Mitsubishi’s proposed instruction did not include the language of the missing second paragraph from plaintiffs’ proposed instruction that Mitsubishi now characterizes as a critical omission.”
As a result, the plaintiffs asserted, Mitsubishi waived its challenge to the omission.
The plaintiffs additionally argued that the crashworthiness charge was proper under Pennsylvania law and that verdict form confirms that the jury found in the plaintiffs’ favor on the various elements of the crashworthiness test.
“Even if Mitsubishi’s challenge to this court’s crashworthiness instructions had merit (and it does not),” the plaintiffs added, “a new trial would not be necessary or appropriate unless this court’s jury instructions concerning plaintiffs’ other alternate grounds for recovery—consumer expectation, risk utility and failure to warn—also were defective, which is something Mitsubishi nowhere contends in its motion for post-trial relief.”
Mitsubishi also took aim at the size of the jury’s verdict for the Amagasus, which included $176.5 million in compensatory damages and $800 million in punitive damages.
But Sherry asserted that the defendants did not present evidence on damages at trial to support their claim that the award was excessive.
“If you’re going to court and saying ‘that was wrong, that needs to be reduced,’ one would expect that you would have evidence to point to,” Sherry said.
Sherry said that, despite the many issues raised in the defendants’ post-trial filings, “there is not the scintilla of merit that should even raise any level of eyebrow.”
The parties’ motions are pending before Judge Sierra Thomas Street of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, who also presided over the trial.
The plaintiff claimed that an improper seatbelt design in Mitsubishi’s 1992 model 3000GT sports car allowed Francis Amagasu to sustain head injuries in a car crash that left him quadriplegic.
According to Sherry, the case itself was fairly simple, involving significant agreement on issues of what happened and the extent of the plaintiffs’ injuries.
“This is not a situation where there’s a lot of ambiguity or mystery,” he said. “Instead it is remarkably straightforward in all aspects.”